Level Up
by Kerowyn6
Summary: Julia's not sure if she can trust this mysterious 'Tim', but it seems it's her only choice if she wants to save her younger sister, who's gotten involved with people more dangerous even than mobsters (read: Elders and Immortals). Marethyu's just relieved to be able to use a normal name again.
1. Chapter 1

**God, this sucks... it's probably riddled with typos and stuff, and I know Marethryu's OOC, but I'm too tired to do anything about it. **

**Julia's an OC. Her sisters Jasmine and Jay are OCs. Chloe is an OC. **

**I'm doing my absolute best to avoid Mary- or Anti-Suedom, so tell me what you think of character development. Although please don't say, in your review for the first chapter, 'I think Julia's really underdeveloped, so you should work on her character'. It's the first chapter. Give her time.**

There was a strange man watching Julia from the edge of the playground.

She hadn't noticed him at first- in fact, he was exceedingly hard to notice. She'd only realized he was there because a beggar had asked him for money. Her friend Chloe, who was babysitting a neighbor's kids with her, had said that he looked a quite genteel sort of stalker- but this was from Chloe, who had been stalked three times by various ex-boyfriends, collected restraining orders for fun and bred exotic tomatoes.

And once she looked harder at him (surreptitiously, or so she thought) she realized she'd seen him before. More than once, in fact.

She'd seen him in a cafe next to her school. She'd seen him standing at a corner outside her older sister Jasmine's tae kwon do class. And, most disturbingly, she'd seen him in her younger sister Jay's drawings.

When Julia confided this to Chloe, her friend's eyes lit up.

"That's soooo creepy!" she said excitedly, as though she'd found out that she'd won the lottery. "You should ask Jay where she's seen him."

Julia looked at Chloe askance. "This is Jay," she said by way of explanation.

Chloe cocked her head and looked pensive. "Point taken." She glanced down at her watch. "We should be heading back. Simone said she'd give us cookies if we brought the kids back unscathed, and I don't want to test our luck. Plus, they'll be wanting an afternoon snack soon."

Julia nodded, casting one more furtive glance at the edge of the park.

The man was gone.

She nudged Chloe viciously and pointed at the perfectly empty sidewalk. "He's not there any more," she hissed.

Chloe raised her eyebrows appreciatively. "You know, I thought it was cool when Liam wore makeup and a wig to try to fool me, but this takes the ticket. You've got yourself a magical disappearing stalker here. Coolio." She glanced at Julia's face. "Oh, don't worry. I'll watch out for him on the way back."

But he was not to be seen, however enthusiastically Chloe looked. And after fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies and Simone's six year old daughter spray-dying Julia's usually drab dishwater brown hair with orange streaks, she had all but forgotten her fear of the strange man.

So much so that when her mother asked her to walk the dog around the block, she convinced herself she'd been overreacting.

The family dog was old and crotchety, and walked at a speed of about 0.5 miles per hour. This didn't usually bother Julia. The twenty odd minutes it took her to walk around the apartment block was generally a break of calm in the turmoil of her day.

It started to really worry her, however, when she saw the man in the dark coat crossing the street thirty feet from her.

She glanced down at the dog who, at the speed of continents shifting, put one leg ever so carefully in front of the other.

"Hurry up, you old lump!" Julia hissed. An arthritic head turned and regarded her skeptically, then ignored her. She looked back at the man. He was twenty feet away, and walking towards her rapidly. She sighed and started jogging back to her apartment, dragging the dog behind her like a sled.

She heard footsteps close behind her and quickened her pace, but then the man was right behind her and she was acting without thinking, turning into the nearest alleyway- and she realized it was a dead end. The old brick path which, ten years prior, would have cut straight through to the next street, had been boarded up and was now a vacant lot.

Spinning around, she had just enough time to open her mouth to scream before a gloved hand muffled her voice.

She kicked the dog, hoping it would start howling, but all it did was puff a bit.

The man's face was hidden mostly by a hood, but she could see a pair of bright blue eyes. Not what she would have expected for some sort of psychopathic rapist, but, well, you live and you learn, she thought. Or not.

"I'm going to let go of you now," the man said in a low voice. "Do not scream, or make any kind of commotion. I'm not going to harm you. I just want to talk. Do you understand?"

She nodded frantically, eyes wide.

The man took his hand from her mouth and Julia sucked in a few sweet breaths. To be fair, the man probably hadn't know she had a cold and could barely breath through her nose.

"What do you want?" she managed.

"I need to know if I can trust you."

She looked at him, his words not registering. "_What_?"

"I said, I need to know if I can trust you."

"_You_," Julia said slowly, just to make sure she wasn't having some form of auditory hallucination, "trust _me_? I'm not the one stalking little girls! What did you want with me?"

"I needed to know if I could trust you."

"Is that all you say?"

"No. Bananas. Catfish. Pirate ships."

"Are you insane?"

"No. Are you?"

She spluttered for a moment. "I'm starting to think I may be, because this conversation is so not happening." She looked at his eyes and, true to his words, they looked perfectly, utterly sane. Scarily so. She sighed. "Yes, for what it's worth, you can trust me. With what, though?"

"It's about your sister."

Snorting, Julia took a step back and surveyed the man. He was dressed head to foot in a heavy black cloak, and she could see no identifying feature save his sky-blue eyes. "You mean Jasmine? Really? What do you want, an autograph? Because I really wouldn't have figured you for the fanboy type. Still, it takes all sorts." Mentally, she cursed herself. Why was she being so cocky? She'd heard of the survival instinct. Maybe she had the opposite.

"I mean Jay."

"Jay?"

"Yes." He stood back and sighed. "She's in trouble. Someone needs to know."

"And couldn't you just have stopped me politely on the sidewalk? Sent me an email? Something more normal?"

"No. I can't afford to attract attention like that."

"But don't you think wandering around the streets of Seattle in a medieval cloak is likely to achieve the same effect in the long run?"

"You'd be surprised how few notice me."

Julia ran a hand through her hair and absentmindedly patted the dog. "Listen, you're creepy. I can't see your face, you might have weapons under that cloak. I don't even know your name."

He brushed the hood back, revealing a rather messy head of straw-blond hair and a surprisingly youthful face. "And you can call me... Tim."

"Tim."

"It was the first name I thought of." He smiled briefly, and it looked odd on his face, as though it utilized muscles that rarely had a work out. "I've always been able to ruin a good dramatic moment."

"Fine. Tim. Nothing wrong with that." She realized that he'd avoided her second question. "And what about the weapons?"

Tim pursed his lips. "Nothing I would use on you."

Julia briefly wondered how far she would make it if she sprinted, and if she would be able to drag the dog in front of Tim and use it as a barricade. "Nothing you would use on me, eh? That's good to know." Her voice had gone up in pitch.

"I'm not going to hurt you. The only reason I'm talking to you is because your sister Jay is... well, she's hanging out with the wrong people and she's going to get hurt. Trust me, I've seen it happen before."

"Jay? The wrong people? But Jay is... Jay is... she's a good girl! She gets straight As, she's got great hopes for her future, she worships Jasmine... she's not one of those teenage rebels!"

Tim rubbed his eyes with his one visible hand. "Just take my word on it," he said tiredly. "She was jealous of Jasmine. She thought she could get her own power by consorting with a certain class of person. They're using her."

Julia stumbled back and leaned against the wall, her mind reeling. "You mean drug dealers? Alcohol? _Prostitution_?" A horrible thought struck her. "Jay's not... she hasn't... no one's..." Her eyes started stinging.

"No, nothing like that!" Julia sagged with relief. Then: "They're more dangerous than drug dealers or pimps or mobsters."

A cold dread settled over Julia, and she looked up at Tim hopelessly. "You sure know how to comfort a girl."

Tim looked at her, deadly serious. "Just talk to Jay and tell her to be careful. And if you're in a tight corner... I'll find you."


	2. Chapter 2

**Okay, this is a _weird _chapter. Don't read unless you're good at grasping conclusions from abstract bits of text. But the gist of it is that Julia's trying to convince herself that everything's normal. **

**Please review!**

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"Hey, Jay? Can I talk to you?"

Julia's younger sister looked up. "Yeah?" Jay frowned at Julia's expression. "Are you all right?"

Julia bit her lip and shook her head. "Jay... you know I love you, right?"

"Yeah?"

"And if something was going on, you'd tell me?"

Hmm. Jay looked suddenly shifty. "Yeah...?"

"Well... I heard you'd fallen in with some bad people."

"I haven't. Who told you that?"

"Oh, just someone I know. So you're all right?"

"Yes, Julia. I'm fine." A look of worry crossed Jay's face. "Who is this someone?"

"Oh, just this guy I know named Tim."

"Tim."

"Yeah, I don't think it's his real name." She paused. "So... you haven't joined a street gang or anything?"

"No!" spat Jay, "And if I had, it wouldn't be any of your business, nor that of some random guy called Tim!" She stood there, fuming, as Julia backed away slowly. "Who is he, your boyfriend?"

"No!" Julia retorted, repulsed. "He's this creepy guy in a black cloak who stalked me!"

The tension froze. Jay had paled like snow. "A creepy guy in a black cloak?"

"Yes!" There was a pause. "Do you know him?"

"No, of course not, don't be silly."

And Julia got the feeling that Jay was telling the truth, although maybe she wasn't being completely forthcoming. And so that was that.

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Breakfast the next morning was a subdued affair. Jay was ignoring Julia. Jasmine had sprained her ankle at a martial arts competition the night before, and spent the entire meal with her foot on the table with an ice pack over it. Their father, who was a linguist studying southern African dialects, was somewhere in Angola. There mother was a naturally quiet person.

Julia stared moodily at her plate, carved an eyepatch on her pancake, and reflected on what seemed to be an entire new world slowly encroaching on her life. First Jay's involvement with some mysterious group, and then a weird guy following her around the city.

Jay and Jasmine had always wanted adventure. Julia hadn't. She'd read soppy romantic pulp fiction, made progress in her her jazz class, and studied hard for History/Geo class. That was her. Not one of those girls who found out that magic actually existed or the entire world was being run by a computer or a race of giant orangutans were plotting an invasion from outer space.

And so, as a proof to karma that she would lead a normal life, goddammit, she decide that she would text Chloe and ask her if she wanted to go to get a bagel.

This didn't work out.

The cafe was closed, there was construction on the road that led to the second nearest one, and on the way back Chloe tripped, fell into a puddle, and ruined her new shirt.

Julia reacted in the way any teenage girl like her would, by holing herself in her room and watching five episodes straight of Glee. She had a crush on whoever it was who played Finn, although she'd heard rumors that his character died.

As one might deduce, this was not the best start to the day.

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At two in the afternoon she decided that maybe it would be a good idea to get some exercise, so she pulled out her iPod and started off on her usual run to the football stadium and back.

About halfway there she realized that Tim had fallen into step beside her. She glared at him, but decided she was probably hallucinating the entire thing anyway, so kept jogging.

"Jay's in trouble," he said after a while.

She didn't answer, just commented on how stupid he looked jogging through Seattle in a heavy black cloak.

A little while later, probably realizing that she wasn't going to say anything else, he jogged into a side street and disappeared. Julia thought she smelled the vague scent of oranges, although not very good ones. Whatever it was, it smelled bitter.

And it might have been her imagination, and she seriously hoped it was, but there might, just possibly, have been a ten-foot high spaniel following her from a few streets back.

Probably not, she decided. Things like that wouldn't dare happen to her. _Would they_.

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It turned out that the ten-foot high spaniel _did_ exist, and moreover it was following Julia. This didn't please her greatly, but up close it was actually rather cute, and didn't even attack her like she would have assumed a giant dog would. It just sniffed at her a bit and then trotted off towards the alley down which Tim had disappeared, occasionally lowering its head to the ground and nuzzled the cement.

It was at this moment that Julia came out of shock, recognized that this was all really happening, and sprinted back home in a record time of two and a half minutes.

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"GOD HELP ME, JAY, IF YOU DON'T EXPLAIN TO ME THIS INSTANT WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON, I WILL TRY TO FIND OUT THE TRUTH MYSELF!"

It was a good thing neither their mother nor Jasmine was home, as Julia's shout echoed for several seconds around the apartment building. The dog whined.

There a moment of silence, then:

"All right, I'm in the kitchen..."

Julia marched in, ready to interrogate her younger sister. But Jay was standing meekly at the counter looking at her feet.

Jay was smart, but she also was not very experienced at hiding long pointy bits of weaponry from her sister, so Julia yanked the sword out of the trash can (the hilt had been showing) and waved it disbelievingly.

"What on earth are you doing with a sword, Jay?" she demanded, wiping some jam off the blade.

"I was... practicing fencing! For school! We're doing it in sports class."

"Jay, this is a _longsword_. Not a rapier or an epee or whatever it is you use for fencing."

"I wanted to get the authentic experience of fighting with a medieval weapon, and this was the only one I could find!"

Julia leant the sword carefully against the fridge and leaned back, closing her eyes. "Fine," she said flatly. "Just fine." She opened one eye and peered at her sister. "So... I suppose you have a logical explanation for the giant dog that followed my today?" Jay's face went blank. "I thought not."

Jay suddenly looked close to tears, and Julia sighed. "What's the matter now?"

"They said no one would get hurt, and you guys wouldn't be involved! They said- they said-" she dissolved into uncontrollable sobs, but as Julia moved closer to comfort her, she looked up and glared. "Don't come near me!" she spat. "This is all your fault! If only you hadn't poked your nose into my life-"

The unfairness of this accusation hit Julia like a hammer, and she moved to defend herself.

"How is this my fault? You're the one who got jealous of Jasmine and started messing with these people!"

Jay froze. "I am _not_ jealous of Jasmine!"

She grabbed the sword from where it stood and stormed out of the house.

In a flash, Julia realized that if it meant she could protect those she loved, than she would be the kind of girl who discovered other worlds.

She snuck out after Jay.

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Following Jay was easy.

In the same way that black cloaks are not commonplace in Seattle, neither are three foot long swords wielded by angry teenagers, and so Jay left a trail of very confused civilians in her wake. Not once did Jay look back to check that Julia hadn't followed her. Julia supposed that Jay must think she knew her older sister- in the same way that she had thought that she knew Jay.

_My, my, what things we're discovering about each-other this weekend. Isn't it such a fantastic family bonding experience?_

Jay turned left a few blocks down and Julia, peering from around the corner, watched as she let herself into an old apartment building.

Letting a few minutes go by, Julia crept after her and examined the door. What was she going to do now? It looked there was an old key code pad, with some of the keys rusted over.

Well, wouldn't the pass code be made up of the keys that weren't? The countless fingers would rub what rust formed off...

So. 1, 5, 6 and 9. She had no way of knowing what order the'd be in.

She decided just to grit her teeth, try a random code, and hope for the best.

Typing in '1695', she was just about to lean closer to the door to see if it had worked when she heard a noise from the mouth of the alley. She spun around, and this was why when the blade whipped out from the door it caught her on her right arm and not her throat. Most people would have deemed this to be a lucky save, but Julia was not in a situation to be contemplating such things, so she doubled over and let out a string of curses. The door remained close.

It was, however, at this point that the noise recurred, and this time she did see something, a ten foot high spaniel something in fact. And this time, it was growling.


End file.
